[1.12.5] Bluedog Design Bureau - Stockalike Saturn, Apollo, and more! (v1.14.0 "металл" 30/Sep/2024)

[pTrevTrevs]

Apollo 17 Part 3: Apollo at the Limit:

I'm starting to wonder just how many screenshots I can get away with posting here; other than a few parts on the rover, more and more of them don't even feature BDB...

 

Anyway, the final moonwalk of Apollo 17 will be centered around the central peak of Tsiolkovsky crater, where it is expected that the oldest geologic material will be found. This colossal mountain was formed shortly after the initial Tsiolkovsky impact, when rock which was forced down from its original position rebounded and pushed up a great mass of material from beneath the surface. Although this phenomenon can happen on Earth, it is much more common on the Moon, where the lower gravity enables much smaller craters to form central peaks. Although appearing steep and jagged from orbit, this mountain is much like the other slopes encountered on the moon, being low and rounded. Thanks to this, the LRV should have no trouble reaching the summit of the mountain and providing the mission with what will likely become some of the most iconic photographs of the entire Apollo program...

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It's the start of the third day on the lunar surface, and the rover TV camera films a tired but still eager crew as they emerge from Challenger's hatch for one more foray into the unknown.

The first stop of the day is actually an unscheduled visit to the ALSEP site, because during the night it appears that the communications unit has fallen over. It doesn't take much time to reset the dish, but it's an annoyance nonetheless.

With the ALSEP repaired (again), the astronauts set off on toward their objective: a shallow slope that seems to lead right up to the mountain's summit.

During this drive the rover moves across terrain with a slope of up to thirty degrees, and takes its crew higher than any previous Apollo mission. At the summit, Apollo 17's moonwalkers stand some five hundred meters above their landing site, shattering the previous record set on Apollo 16.

The first station of the day is just below the summit itself, where the astronauts are greeted with an unbelievable view of the entire crater rim... As they get to work collecting core samples and regolith, they cannot help but take their eyes off the task at hand to marvel at this landscape, which they are the first to witness in this fashion.

A little further up the slope the crew obtains a better overlook of the southern half of the crater. Part of their checklist here involves taking high-resolution images of the lunar mare south of the central peak, but the LMP takes a moment to raise his visor and show his face on the LRV's camera.

Facing northward, they can spot their landing site, although the distance is so great that Challenger appears as nothing more than a speck of light amongst the endless field of boulders and hills.

The astronauts spend about an hour and a half on the summit, and then begin the difficult descent to the crater floor. With a constant downhill slope, the LRV accidentally reaches the highest speed yet recorded on the lunar surface; well over ten meters per second.

The downhill drive also includes a short stop on the slope of the mountain, in a small hollow where the ground is almost flat.

Once on the crater floor, the moonwalkers make another unscheduled stop at a target of opportunity: a small crater with a rather prominent rim.

Once returned to the LM, the LMP disembarks and begins preparations to close out the moonwalk while the commander moves the rover to its parking spot.

After about three and a half hours on the surface, the final moonwalk of Apollo 17 has come to an end. Overall, the visit to Tsiolkovsky has been a resounding to success.

 

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A few hours after the hatch was sealed, Challenger lifts off from the Moon, captured on film by the rover's cameras.

One orbit later, the LM becomes visible through America's windows, alongside the full Earth.

One docking later, and the crew starts moving material between the two spacecraft in preparation for the return to Earth.

Loaded up with disposables and garbage, Challenger is jettisoned. Unfortunately, a guidance system error prevents mission control from directing the LM to crash into the Moon, and the derelict spacecraft will drift in lunar orbit for around a year until the Moon's irregular gravitational field will pull it out of orbit.

The crew remains in lunar orbit aboard America for three more days, continuing to take photographs of both the lunar surface and the Earth. The so-called "Big Blue Marble" photos become an instant sensation, and they join the Apollo 8 Earthrise photos as some of the most sentimental images of the program.

At the end of this time, America performs its TLI maneuver. Back on Earth, society continues to experience the turbulent aftershocks of the 1960s. In Southeast Asia, the USAF's Linebacker II bombing campaign has finally dragged the North Vietnamese government back to the negotiating table, bring the nation one step closer to ending its longest war. In the Midwest, unprecedented blizzards caused the near shutdown of all public infrastructure, grinding airlines and mass transit to a halt. In Kansas City, former President Harry Truman was dying, and in lunar orbit, the spacecraft America was bringing three men home from the Moon.

Now, as the late, great Ron Evans once said, "Talk about being a spaceman, this is it!"

I've probably said it before, but the chance to make this spacewalk must have been almost enough to negate the jealousy that must have come bundled with the seat assignment as CMP on an Apollo flight. Fewer people in history have had this experience than have walked on the Moon itself, and what a privilege it must have been. It's really not hard to imagine why people like Ken Mattingly actually volunteered to be command module pilots when one thinks about it...

Anyway, at the conclusion of a mission that has lasted nearly two weeks, America begins the final leg of its journey. The unorthodox alignment of the Moon on this mission rears its head again, as the command module's reentry and splashdown will both take place in darkness. Although no manned spacecraft has landed in such harsh conditions, the US Navy and recovery controllers at NASA are by now more than confident in their skills to get the job done.

At about 02:00 on a windy morning in December 1972, the passengers of an airliner over the South Atlantic is witness to a great bolt of fire streaming through the sky from west to east. What they're looking at is the command module America, returning from the most ambitious manned spaceflight in history, with the first pieces of the far side of our Moon. Just as the prophet Elijah ascended to heaven in a chariot of fire, so too does the crew of Apollo 17 return to Earth in one.

The South Atlantic is hardly comparable to the gentle Pacific Ocean to which the Apollo crews are accustomed to, but the conditions are mitigated somewhat by the time of year. December is the middle of high summer in the southern hemisphere, and instead of the frigid waters which some might expect, the crew open the hatch to a surprisingly temperate environment. Regardless, it's not long before the recovery teams from the USS Ticonderoga fetch the spacecraft and its occupants from the water, bringing an end to their record-breaking voyage. Apollo 17's landing site is the only one which cannot be spotted by observers from Earth. While the final two Apollo crews would capture Tsiolkovsky crater on film and in photographs, it would not be until the early twenty-first century that Challenger's resting place would receive another detailed look from observers. As for America, she would find her way to a display case at Houston's Manned Spacecraft Center, the last and greatest relic of one of mankind's greatest journeys...

 

[Jcking]

6 hours ago, billbobjebkirk said:

I'd love to see your take on a full IPP moonbase mission if you're up to it, though obviously not until after a well-deserved break!

Unfortunately the design you see with the overgrown reusable landers seems to have been only notional. NAR's lunar shelter which made use of those landers had modules strapped on the sides of the lander, which would be assembled on the surface and buried in lunar soil. More information can be found in the Lunar Base Synthesis Study (May 1971). https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search?q=lunar base synthesis study

 

Edited February 15, 2022 by Jcking
The forum was playing games with post submission.

[Entr8899]

The Castor 30XL's colours are flipped, but the engine autoshroud is normal. The umbilical connection also seems to be the wrong colour, and is absent on the "black" variant:

The Peacekeeper second stage's shroud is completely absent. I've seen one or two other people mention this in the past, and it possibly has something to do with a mod conflict? :

[Cheesecake]

2 hours ago, Entr8899 said:

The Castor 30XL's colours are flipped, but the engine autoshroud is normal. The umbilical connection also seems to be the wrong colour, and is absent on the "black" variant:

The Peacekeeper second stage's shroud is completely absent. I've seen one or two other people mention this in the past, and it possibly has something to do with a mod conflict? :

Yes, I posted it some weeks ago here.

[Beccab]

7 hours ago, Jcking said:

Unfortunately the design you see with the overgrown reusable landers seems to have been only notional. NAR's lunar shelter which made use of those landers had modules strapped on the sides of the lander, which would be assembled on the surface and buried in lunar soil. More information can be found in the Lunar Base Synthesis Study (May 1971). https://ntrs.nasa.gOnov/search?q=lunar base synthesis study

 

14 hours ago, billbobjebkirk said:

Friggin BadS!!!!

I'd love to see your take on a full IPP moonbase mission if you're up to it, though obviously not until after a well-deserved break!

One thing I was thinking about recreating was this if I can find more info on how it is launched and what it actually is, if it does exist

This, or one of the ALSS rover proposals now that I found more stuff on them

[GoldForest]

28 minutes ago, Beccab said:

One thing I was thinking about recreating was this if I can find more info on how it is launched and what it actually is, if it does exist

This, or one of the ALSS rover proposals now that I found more stuff on them

I think you're looking for Starship  Joking aside, that is interesting. It looks to be a modified S-IV probably. 

[CobaltWolf]

16 hours ago, billbobjebkirk said:

Could you also add a proper launch escape tower for it as well? I believe that was part of the plans for Big BasicallyCleanSheetInGemini'sClothing

We're adding one based on the Apollo tower, it's in one of the pics I posted.

 

8 hours ago, Entr8899 said:

The Castor 30XL's colours are flipped, but the engine autoshroud is normal. The umbilical connection also seems to be the wrong colour, and is absent on the "black" variant:

The Peacekeeper second stage's shroud is completely absent. I've seen one or two other people mention this in the past, and it possibly has something to do with a mod conflict? :

5 hours ago, Cheesecake said:

Yes, I posted it some weeks ago here.

Pain.

 

2 hours ago, Beccab said:

One thing I was thinking about recreating was this if I can find more info on how it is launched and what it actually is, if it does exist

Isn't that just supposed to be one of the standard IPP cylindrical modules with legs on the bottom?

[Viper2]

Okay we already have the airbrake fins and big radial parachutes, so my question is, do we get some more parts for recovery of saturn stages, like 4m and 6m heatshields ?

You can find a lot of recovery proposals on the net, would be nice to have some in game

[Beccab]

8 minutes ago, CobaltWolf said:

Isn't that just supposed to be one of the standard IPP cylindrical modules with legs on the bottom?

The pic next to it is of the MEM with a cylinder in the middle so yeah probably, but I was wondering if that design (4 engines on top, ladder on the bottom, those weird legs)  did actually exist or if someone working at IPP just went to one of their artists and told them to take a cylinder and make it look like it can land on the moon

[Entr8899]

3 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

Pain.

Sorry

[Starhelperdude]

the 4.25m non-SAF fairing base seems to have vanished from the game (the SAF-one is still here

[Zorg]

1 hour ago, Starhelperdude said:

the 4.25m non-SAF fairing base seems to have vanished from the game (the SAF-one is still here

Looks like a naming conflict, fixed now

[Invaderchaos]

Making some progress w/ Pegasus:

[billbobjebkirk]

8 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

We're adding one based on the Apollo tower, it's in one of the pics I posted.

Doy! I saw that picture and was so caught up with the S-IVB adapter that I totally missed the LES tower! Glad to see it's making it in!

[Adventures]

On 2/13/2022 at 1:50 PM, Beccab said:

The Integrated Program Plan (1969)
Manned martian landing, part two


This second part of the mission shows on the real focus of the Integrated Program Plan manned mars mission, which is arrival, landing and return. Most of the text here is paraphrased from the original presentation of the IPP to Nixon's space task group which can be found here:
https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/19690804_manned_mars_landing_presentation_to_the_space_task_group_by_dr._wernher_von_braun.pdf

The mission starts right from where the last post ended, with the acceleration of the twin spacecrafts  by the two side nuclear shuttles to trans-Mars injection velocity. These are then shut down, separated from the planetary vehicle and then retro-fired to place them on a highly elliptic path returning to the original assembly orbit altitude. After a coast of several days, the nuclear shuttles arrive at the original assembly orbit altitude and are retro-fired again to place them into a circular orbit where they rendevouz with their refuelling depot for reuse in geosynchronous or lunar missions.

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The ability of man to withstand a zero gravity environment for periods of time exceeding a few weeks was still an unknown at the time. Because of this, the option to provide artificial gravity for the crew during the planetary trip was kept open, and in case early missions indicated the need for artificial gravity the two spaceships could be docked end-to-end and rotated in the plane of the longitudinal axis during extended coast periods.

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During the outbound coast to Mars of approximately nine months, the crew conducts experimental activities such as solar and planetary observations: solar wind measurements, and biological monitoring of the crew, test plants, and animals. At the end of this period, final space vehicle checkout for the Mars orbit insertion maneuver is followed by the retro-fire of the nuclear engine to place the planetary vehicle into an elliptical Mars orbit. The orbit at Mars is elliptical both to reduce fuel requirements for the mission and allow a wider range of planet coverage by optical observations at the cost of requiring a beefier ascent stage on the lander

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MMU inspired from this:

The various Viking landers of IPP provided important clues concerning the existence of life on Mars, but did not fully answer the questions as to the possible pathogenic nature of such life. Hence, on the first manned mission, it was be desirable to obtain surface samples prior to the actual human landing and subsequent contamination of the planet, using 12 sterile sample return probes carried on the transfer spacecrafts.

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Sample gathering and launch:

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Once the analysis has revealed no significant biological hazards, the Mars Excursion Module can then proceed to the surface and the samples could be returned to Earth for more detailed analysis, along with the more selective (but perhaps Earth-contaminated) samples obtained by the crew. It's time for three brave people then board the MEM, undock from the main spacecraft and prepare for reentry

Houston, Acidalia base here. The MEM has landed!

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The Mars surface activity on the first mission is similar in many ways to the one of Apollo 11. Notable, however, is the much longer stay time (30-60 days per MEM), thus allowing more extensive observations, experimentation and execution of mission scientific objectives. Surface operations include experiments to be performed in the MEM laboratory as well as the external operations on Mars' surface.

A small, life-support augumentation rover also allows trips to interesting surface features beyond the immediate landing area.

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After 30 days have passed, the crew returns with 90 pounds of samples inside the ascent stage of the MEM and prepares for liftoff. In case the ascent engine doesn't relight and the crew is stranded the second MEM is launched with only one person on a rescue mission; but luckily, that isn't the case here either

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Docking:

At the completion of the 80-day period at Mars, the ascent stage and remaining MEM are discarded and transfer spaceships will begin the return leg of the journey. The nuclear stage is ignited for this propulsive maneuver, boosting each spaceship out of Mars orbit. With the extensive Mars exploration activities behind them, the crew at this point can begin a more thorough analysis of the data and samples gathered at Mars, and prepare for the next major milestone of the trip - a close encounter with the planet Venus.

As the twin spacecrafts gain speed and near the closest approach of the Venus flyby, four entry probes are deployed to study the atmosphere of the planet in what is effectively the last phase of the mission before returning to Earth while the crews conduct radar mapping of the surface

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Two years have passed since the people on board last saw the Earth, and the time has come for the mission to end: the nuclear stages activate for one last time, bringing the crew into LEO to dock to the space base that is waiting for their arrival.


The year is now 1983: there are orbiters around mars and venus, massive space stations in lunar orbit and GEO, rovers on Mars and more than 50 people have landed on the Moon. And now, the first people in history have returned after setting foot on Mars, with many more to follow.

This is what the Integrated Program Plan was

 

Oh, and I almost forgot -  here you go
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1uH4D8O1CBUDfKZugCmUAIEy0pl9ta3xS?usp=sharing
There's a lot of required mods - Tantares, BDB, OPT, ConformalDecals, Cormorant, Restock, the SSME variants plugin and X-33/Venturestar are the first that come to my mind, but there may be more

I'll try to get it on kerbalx too if necessary

What mods did you use specifically for the MEM? the drive folder is unaccusable for me

[biohazard15]

@CobaltWolf

WRT Biggus G: is there going to be different size options for "tail" diameter in order to mount different (0.625, 0.9375, 1.25) docking ports?

[Zorg]

2 hours ago, biohazard15 said:

@CobaltWolf

WRT Biggus G: is there going to be different size options for "tail" diameter in order to mount different (0.625, 0.9375, 1.25) docking ports?

Yes

[Galileo chiu]

will a S-II wet workshop come? 

http://www.astronautix.com/s/saturniistagewetworkshop.html

[CobaltWolf]

13 hours ago, biohazard15 said:

WRT Biggus G: is there going to be different size options for "tail" diameter in order to mount different (0.625, 0.9375, 1.25) docking ports?

Indeed. I just haven't shown them since they're only blocked in.

 

9 hours ago, Galileo chiu said:

will a S-II wet workshop come?

Maybe (up to Zorg), but not for this update. We're more or less content locked for the Apollo/Saturn update, pretty much just waiting on the conical Big G and Pegasus satellite. Once this release is out we can go kind of crazy.

[septemberWaves]

Are there any thoughts on the focus of the next update, or is nothing set in stone yet?

[zakkpaz]

52 minutes ago, septemberWaves said:

Are there any thoughts on the focus of the next update, or is nothing set in stone yet?

I think they said something about redoing Atlas, I'd love to see it brought up to the same level as the new saturn parts!

[JustDark]

1 hour ago, septemberWaves said:

Are there any thoughts on the focus of the next update, or is nothing set in stone yet?

From what I've seen the devs talk about here, the next update will be on alternate/canceled Apollo stuff, so things from Apollo Applications Program like the LESA moonbase, AES, and other wacky Apollo-derived stuff

[Starhelperdude]

oh no...

 

[CobaltWolf]

3 hours ago, septemberWaves said:

Are there any thoughts on the focus of the next update, or is nothing set in stone yet?

2 hours ago, zakkpaz said:

I think they said something about redoing Atlas, I'd love to see it brought up to the same level as the new saturn parts!

1 hour ago, JustDark said:

From what I've seen the devs talk about here, the next update will be on alternate/canceled Apollo stuff, so things from Apollo Applications Program like the LESA moonbase, AES, and other wacky Apollo-derived stuff

We need to get a list together of what we want to include, for scope reasons if nothing else. We uh, haven't yet. Myself and Zorg are likely going to continue working on alternate Apollo/Saturn/LM/Skylab stuff. Invader has their own focus with the probes that they're also going to be working on. There's a lot of really interesting stuff we can do, so it's more a matter of figuring out priorities. Hopefully we'll be able to talk about it with some more confidence soon.

[pTrevTrevs]

1 hour ago, CobaltWolf said:

We need to get a list together of what we want to include, for scope reasons if nothing else. We uh, haven't yet. Myself and Zorg are likely going to continue working on alternate Apollo/Saturn/LM/Skylab stuff. Invader has their own focus with the probes that they're also going to be working on. There's a lot of really interesting stuff we can do, so it's more a matter of figuring out priorities. Hopefully we'll be able to talk about it with some more confidence soon.

Gonna take this opportunity to lobby for additional J-series LM modifications, like the extended MESA or maybe even a texture variant or two:

http://www.ninfinger.org/karld/My Space Museum/mesa.htm

http://www.ninfinger.org/models/LM-11/LunarModuleOrion.html